The horrifying event that went down yesterday morning in Connecticut was accidentally blamed on Ryan Lanza for a period of time. Turns out, the suspected shooter is actually Adam Lanza, Ryan's younger brother. Oops. Unfortunately, a Facebook profile for one Ryan Lanza was widely circulated when he was still considered the shooter, and he just so happened to like the video game Mass Effect. You can probably see where this is going. Folks seeking a scapegoat flooded the game's Facebook page, blaming it for the shooting.

According to Kotaku, the comments ranged from referring to Mass Effect as "evil" to demands for the game to be banned:

"There is a connection between violent games and senseless violence in real life," wrote Facebook user Becky. Another user, Melanie, said, "Ban this game and the people who created such sickness." And Catherine even wrote, "I am sure none of these precious children had this game on their Santa list... God help protect us from all the evil our society promotes."Part of this is obviously just people trying to make sense of a senseless tragedy, and is to be expected. On the other hand, it's pretty obvious to anyone even remotely familiar with the game that Mass Effect had absolutely nothing to do with what went down in Connecticut. In fact, the third game in the franchise even features a mission where the protagonist actually saves a bunch of kids from the space equivalent of a school shooting. So, yeah.

As of now, it appears that BioWare has altered the page to no longer showcase these posts

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*sigh* Also, I feel super bad for the kid who got blamed first. I mean, have the entire world thing you're a child murdering psychopath, only to find out it was your brother?

" "There is a connection between violent games and senseless violence in real life," wrote Facebook user Becky Laird Gluff. "

I would have to see such evidence myself and see where it comes from. I have some violent relatives (or had) and they hated games and called them trash when I was younger. I play games, Mass Effect being one of my favorites, and I am not violent at all. I know many others who play "violent" (non violent as well) games and they are not even remotely violent. Kind of like blaming the gun. No, it is the person using the gun that does the killing. If no gun was used then maybe a bomb.

Ashley Williams was right. Aliens are a threat to the Alliance superiority.

Seriously, though, it's horrible that people would blame a video game just because it's a video game. And the kid whose face was circulated all over the place...he's gonna have one heck of a time for the confusion. :(

Considering the shooter is dead, I hope no one mistakes the two anymore. It is admittedly a little scary how fast we humans can turn to extreme measures during a tragedy. I'm usually a supporter of gun rights, but yesterday I found myself wishing that we could ban them. My thought process at the time was honestly "we don't deserve to have rights". Obviously, I came to my senses after the rage passed, but I don't blame these people for blowing up.

I swear, the Mass Effect series gets more unjustified shit than any other series of video games.

So it's an alien rape simulator, a mass murder trainer, and the ending is so bad it makes you actively regret every second you spent playing the game, regardless of how much you enjoyed it before? Did I miss anything?

DLC is locked behind 100-kilobyte codes instead of actually, you know, being downloaded. Bioware stole basic Deviantart artwork for the final scene of the game and didn't bother making a child-proportioned model for a child. I could go on but generally yeah, you missed a few things.

Mass Effect is one of the few games that gets everything right. Sex is tasteful. Racism is dealt with in intelligent manners and the violence comes with heavy emotions. It's the kind of game that really makes you weigh each decision and it's consequences. There are so many mindless shooters out there. Why does Mass Effect catch all the flak?

This would be less funny if some legislator in CA didn't really start the ball rolling on banning water because of a joke. But, the same joke gave us the term of "Zohnerism" which means "the use of a true fact to lead a scientifically and mathematically ignorant public to a false conclusion."

No matter how much I dislike Mass Effect (its just not my thing), its one of the sillier games to be blamed for this. I mean, really...even as a renegade you're not killing off innocents in a way as to promote this crap

Some quibbles I have about artistic decisions (I mean, it's annoying that femshep has the same character animations as broshep, but that's more based on economics than aesthetics.)

-Homosexual relationships aren't really handled well until ME3. Among other things, it's only possible to "fix" Jack if you're a male Shepard, by having sex with her. This is kinda troubling. I don't think what that girl was missing was "penis."

-There are a few "hey Sweetheart" moments in the first couple games when playing a female Shepard that are kind of inappropriate (even though they take place in seedy bars, they are still discomforting.)

But it definitely does a whole lot of things right. It is, however, by no means pitch perfect everywhere.

"-There are a few "hey Sweetheart" moments in the first couple games when playing a female Shepard that are kind of inappropriate (even though they take place in seedy bars, they are still discomforting.)"

Well, it is realistic however. If you have a hot chick(and every female Shep I've made was serious smokehouse) walking through a bar, they're gonna get the stupid 'What's up" statements from men. What it was missing in these scenes was the pickup lines so I could have her punch the idiot in the face.

I didn't romance Jack in ME2, but I heard that if you sleep with her you don't get to have a meaningful relationship later, isn't that the case? I thought what "fixed" Jack was her acceptance of the Pragia facility children in the form of the Grissom Accademy students. I thought that was actually a very poetic solution to her guilt and anger. I'm not sure it was penis, DV, but then again I didn't romance her so I'm not a Jackspert.

There are two possible smex outcomes with Jack. When she initially props the question to just ohfk and get it done with she'll have no respect for you. If you continue softly romancing her you'll get to softrock her before the suicide mission and get a real romance out of it.

The thing is "realism" is not a good reason to put something in your game that makes a significant portion of your audience uncomfortable. Video games are supposed to be diversions.

So while those "hey sweetheart" moments may make male players who are playing as femshep conclude something along the lines of "Yo go girl, stick it to the man" it makes female players who have a Shepard that shares their gender feel uncomfortably singled out.

But considering Jack's background, you should be able to romance her whether you are male or female. Garrus, Tali, Jacob, Miranda, and Thane may not be bisexual but Jack *definitely* is, based on the stories she tells.